Transcriber's Notes
This is part of a four-volume set. It contains many references to passages in this volume, other volumes of this set, and other books by various authors.
In Volume I, links to all four volumes, including the other three at Project Gutenberg, have been provided in the cross-reference lists in the first 39 pages. The [Concordance] in Volume IV also contains links to all four volumes. No other external links have been provided.
External links are underlined [like this]; support for them depends on the device and program used to display this eBook.
Each volume of this set contains irregularities that are summarized in the [Transcriber's Notes] at the end of that volume.
PLOTINOS
Complete Works
In Chronological Order, Grouped in Four Periods;
With
BIOGRAPHY by Porphyry, Eunapius, & Suidas,
COMMENTARY by Porphyry,
ILLUSTRATIONS by Jamblichus & Ammonius,
STUDIES in Sources, Development, Influence;
INDEX of Subjects, Thoughts and Words.
by
Kenneth Sylvan Guthrie,
Professor in Extension, University of the South, Sewanee;
A.M., Sewanee, and Harvard; Ph.D., Tulane, and Columbia.
M.D., Medico-Chirurgical College, Philadelphia.
COMPARATIVE LITERATURE PRESS
P. O. Box 42, ALPINE, N.J., U.S.A.
Copyright, 1918, by Kenneth Sylvan Guthrie.
All Rights, including that of Translation, Reserved.
Entered at Stationers' Hall, by
George Bell and Sons, Portugal Street, Lincoln's Inn, London.
PLOTINOS
Complete Works
In Chronological Order, Grouped in Four Periods;
With
BIOGRAPHY by Porphyry, Eunapius, & Suidas,
COMMENTARY by Porphyry,
ILLUSTRATIONS by Jamblichus & Ammonius,
STUDIES in Sources, Development, Influence;
INDEX of Subjects, Thoughts and Words.
by
Kenneth Sylvan Guthrie,
Professor in Extension, University of the South, Sewanee;
A.M., Sewanee, and Harvard; Ph.D., Tulane, and Columbia.
M.D., Medico-Chirurgical College, Philadelphia.
Vol. I
Biographies; Amelian Books, 1–21.
COMPARATIVE LITERATURE PRESS
P. O. Box 42, ALPINE, N.J., U.S.A.
[FOREWORD]
It is only with mixed feelings that such a work can be published. Overshadowing all is the supreme duty to the English-speaking world, and secondarily to the rest of humanity to restore to them in an accessible form their, till now, unexploited spiritual heritage, with its flood of light on the origins of their favorite philosophy. And then comes the contrast—the pitiful accomplishment. Nor could it be otherwise; for there are passages that never can be interpreted perfectly; moreover, the writer would gladly have devoted to it every other leisure moment of his life—but that was impossible. As a matter of fact, he would have made this translation at the beginning of his life, instead of at its end, had it not been for a mistaken sense of modesty; but as no one offered to do it, he had to do it himself. If he had done it earlier, his "Philosophy of Plotinos" would have been a far better work.
Indeed, if it was not for the difficulty and expense of putting it out, the writer would now add to the text an entirely new summary of Plotinos's views. The fairly complete concordance, however, should be of service to the student, and help to rectify the latest German summary of Plotinos, that by Drews, which in its effort to furnish a foundation for Hartmann's philosophy of the unconscious, neglected both origins and spiritual aspects. However, the present genetic insight of Plotinos's development should make forever impossible that theory of cast-iron coherence, which is neither historical nor human.
The writer, having no thesis such as Drews' to justify, will welcome all corrections and suggestions. He regrets the inevitable uncertainties of capitalization (as between the supreme One, Intelligence World-Soul and Daemon or guardian, and the lower one, intelligence, soul and demon or guardian); and any other inconsistencies of which he may have been guilty; and he beseeches the mantle of charity in view of the stupendousness of the undertaking, in which he practically could get no assistance of any kind, and also in view of the almost insuperable difficulties of his own career. He, however, begs to assure the reader that he did everything "ad majorem Dei gloriam."